Battered
by Child of Loki
Summary: (Sequel to 'Bruised'). Brody and LaSalle survived their ordeal, but even after the bruises fade, the damage seems to be more lasting than either of them expected. Brody/LaSalle. Appearances by Loretta & Pride.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own _NCIS: New Orleans_ or its characters...**

**Author's Note: I liked **_**Bruised**_** as a stand-alone, but my imagination being what it is, it just wouldn't let go of a twisted (somewhat cliché) little sequel plot… Sorry. But maybe someone will enjoy?**

**WARNING: REFERENCES TO DARK/SENSITIVE SUBJECT MATTER. NOTHING REMOTELY EXPLICIT. RATED 'T' FOR NOW.**

* * *

It was a dreary sort of night, with the rain pouring down, soaking his t-shirt so that it clung to his skin in the few seconds it took for him to exit his truck and make his way up the walk to the door, where he presently stood with his fist raised. The hand fell to his side. He took a quick pace of the porch, stopping in front of the door once more, squaring his shoulders and taking a deep breath.

Chris LaSalle knocked.

He was surprised a little to see Loretta Wade's worried face appear as it swung open. But it did make complete sense, he supposed. She was the one who had called him with the disturbing news that his partner was not doing well.

That was an understatement.

The compassionate and patient coroner, whose guest house Brody happened to rent, had sounded as worried as hell over the phone, relating how she'd woken to what sounded like distant screams, eventually rising from her bed and going out into her yard to determine if the police needed to be called, or if there was someone in need of medical attention. Apparently, it was lucky the police hadn't been called. For it was Meredith Brody, suffering from the worst sort of night terrors. Loretta knew the woman's troubles, and had used her spare key to let herself into the small cottage, discovering Merri thrashing on her bedroom floor, waking her, trying to comfort her in any way she could. But all Brody had asked for was her partner, speaking Chris' name with a desperate sort of pleading.

He'd been able to imagine the scene all too clearly, for it was one he'd paid witness to numerous times over the past few months, but she'd been getting better. He no longer spent his nights at her place in case she needed him.

"Come in," Loretta said, and Chris entered the residence that was now as familiar to him as his own apartment. He could walk it in his sleep.

"How is she?" he asked quietly, as he dripped onto the entryway rug for a moment, setting his (thankfully) waterproof overnight bag down on a drier part of the floor. He used to have some things tucked away in a closet here. But they'd decided that they were through the rough patch, that they could both move on with their lives... He wasn't sure it would ever truly go away.

Loretta only gave him a sad shake of the head.

"I made her a cup of tea. She's in the living room." She opened her mouth, paused, closed it. And then seemed to rethink her decision to remain silent. "I'll leave you two alone, shall I?"

"If you don't mind," Chris said. He knew Brody would already be doubly upset when she came around to discover that another colleague and friend had witnessed her in a 'bad moment' when she lost all control over her thoughts and feelings. He knew there was nothing Meredith Brody hated more, independent and private creature that she was.

Loretta nodded, gave his shoulder a pat and left him to it.

He pulled a dry shirt out of his bag, unsure of the specific nature of this night's episode, whether he'd need to hold her tight to him, and not wanting to get her soaked and shivering. Then he took off his boots and unfortunately wet socks, leaving them by the door so as to not track in. Finally, he steeled himself for what was going to be an exhausting remainder of the night.

She was sitting on the couch in the living room, with her legs tucked up beneath her, a mug of tea spouting trails of steam into the air above the coffee table where it was placed, apparently untouched, before her. Her eyes were focused -well, _unfocused_\- on a bare patch of wall opposite. He'd found her like this a couple times before. And to be honest, he dreaded it worse than when she woke screaming in the night. Then, at least, all he had to do was gather her to him, rocking her gently, stroking her head and back, whispering comforting words to her, and eventually she calmed. When she went near-catatonic, it took a lot of tender poking and prodding to coax her back out into the world.

But she hadn't gotten like this (that he knew of, anyway) since that horrendous first week. She hadn't even needed him at all in the past three weeks.

"Merri?" He crouched down in front of her, looking up into her blank face. There was no reaction. His mouth went dry with nerves and he absently licked his lips. One of these days, she wouldn't respond to him at all, and he'd regret not forcing her to see a psychologist. She'd been cleared for duty easy enough, since as soon as they'd resumed work, she seemed just the same as she ever was. It had made him severely angry at first, how unaffected she appeared during the day, even as she came apart in his arms at night. He himself had been edgy for weeks, short-tempered and snappish. Brody had had the worst of it, but no one would've been able to tell from her behavior. So, of course she'd fooled the therapist. Hell, she'd probably even have managed to fool Pride if the older man hadn't been able to read from Chris' behavior that something was very wrong with his other junior agent.

Watching her face for an adverse reaction, he gently took one of her hands, and began to stroke his thumb across her knuckles, softly repeating her name.

She blinked, and he nearly sighed in relief, until her whole body jerked and stiffened, her hand tearing away from his to fly to her mouth. Jumping up, he followed her as she raced to the bathroom, doubled up over the toilet bowl and vomited. He could only stand there in shock, damn him, as she heaved and wretched, until finally, she collapsed onto her side, curling up into a ball and sobbing.

Cursing himself, he quickly went to fetch her a glass of water, setting it on the tile floor beside her convulsively weeping form. He wet a washcloth with warm water, and then kneeling beside her, coaxed her hands from her face, gently washing the red, raw-looking, tear-streaked skin. Her sobs seemed to lessen as he cleaned her up, and he was eventually able to coax her to a sitting position to rinse her mouth and drink some of the water.

The woman was definitely more present, but not yet fully herself. That much was apparent in her big, dark eyes as she finally looked at him. She'd begun to shiver, and no wonder. Her thin flannel robe was open, and she only wore a short cotton camisole and panties beneath. Her legs were covered in goose bumps.

"Let's get ya off this cold floor and ya can tell me what's botherin' ya." He tried to urge her up with his hands on her arms, but she refused to budge.

"I'll just be sick again," she said.

"Is it the flu or somethin'?" Chris wondered if maybe physical illness, a fever, could've triggered her nightmares. "Want me ta get Loretta? Maybe she can-"

"I think I'm pregnant." She moaned, a wail as forlorn as a forgotten ghost's. And then the tears began to fall down her cheeks once more. Her fingers dug into her thighs, and she refused to look at him as she sobbed. "I can't do it, LaSalle. I can't have a piece of murdering psychopath inside of me still, sucking the life out of me like a parasite."

_Oh, shit, no._

"They gave you an emergency contraceptive at the hospital, didn't they?" He tried to keep his voice calm. There was no need to panic. Brody was panicking enough as it was. He needed to keep a calm head.

"Yes." She pinned him with a gaze that was pure terror. "But I haven't had my period since... And I've been sick a lot."

"That could all be from stress, Mere." Sound confident. Be confident. There's nothing to worry about. Except... But only cross that bridge when or if they got there. "Have you taken a test? Seen a doctor?"

He rubbed her arms soothingly as she shook her head 'no'.

"There's no need ta panic. It might not be what ya think." Closing her robe and tying it, he placed his hands on her waist and lifted her as he stood, forcing her off from the cold floor and onto her feet. He guided her back to the living room and sat her on the sofa, picking up the now merely warm tea and placing the mug in her hands. He could think of only one thing to settle her mind.

"I'm goin' ta go to the market down the street and get you a test," he said. Then they would know either way. Hopefully it would be negative and put her mind at rest. If not... well, they could tackle the next step together, whatever it may be. "Will you be okay until I get back?"

Seeming much calmer, she nodded at him, sipped her tea. It was difficult to say if she was truly calm, or if she'd simply donned her mask of 'the cool and collected federal agent' once more. But if she possessed the control to put on her facade, then she would be okay alone, at least for the few minutes it would take to run his errand.

As Chris quickly put his unfortunately damp boots back on and walked briskly to his truck, he took a deep breath of the fresh, rain-tinged air in an attempted to quell his own queasiness. Like Brody hadn't had enough to deal with over the past few months… Fate (the old hag) sure seemed to be in a mood for battering his poor partner about.

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**A/N: Oh, there's more… obviously…  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: These chapters will probably be a bit shorter than my usual, but more frequent, as well. **

**WARNING: THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS SOME COARSE LANGUAGE AND REFERENCES TO MATURE SUBJECT MATTER. (Not sure if it's just 'Hard T' or if this fic now merit's an 'M' rating?)**

* * *

They were both staring. He knew even without their staring in each other's direction. Like him, she must have chosen some random swirl of the shower curtain pattern. Or a bit of tile that wasn't quite uniform to the rest covering the bathroom floor. Because neither of them dare look at the other. Or far worse, the plastic sticks neatly arranged in a row upon the edge of the bathtub waiting in detached, unbiased stillness as the timer ticked down.

Because Chris LaSalle knew his partner, knew that in her coherent state, wracked with nerves and anxiety, the last thing she'd want was for him to try to comfort her in any way. He'd learned his lesson before, with sharp tongue-lashings and extremely icy insults alike. It might all change in a matter of minutes. If the pregnancy tests (he'd gotten her two different kits, just so there could be no doubt) were negative, she might carry on all cool and collected, dismissing him for the night. Or she could smile that genuinely gorgeous, happy smile of hers that had become so rare these days, and beam her relief. If... If they were positive, she might further withdraw, succumb to near-catatonia once more. Or she might melt down entirely, which sadly was the one reaction he was confident in dealing with... Except then he'd have to-

His phone buzzed the end of the timer he'd set and they both started. She leapt up from the toilet where she'd been nervously sitting as if she would sprint the three feet to the tub to discover the answer to the question that had been plaguing her mind, giving her nightmares. But then she froze where she stood.

"It'll be better ta know for sure," he said, trying to sound encouraging but not placating, feeling her out to see if this was something she had to do herself, or if she would prefer for him to handle it. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. But her hands were shaking. He slowly moved to stand between her and the menacing pregnancy tests awaiting her attendance. He placed a hand on her arm. She opened her eyes, looking at him with a pleading sort of glance that a few months ago he'd never expect to see from her in the entirety of their partnership.

"I'll do it," he said. "Okay?"

She'd closed her eyes, nodded, breathing heavily through her nose. With more than a little trepidation, he picked up the first of the white plastic sticks. His stomach hollowed out immediately. He picked up the second one, examined it briefly, checked the other two, just to confirm, and then turned to Merri Brody, a woman who he'd seen face down a barrel of a gun without flinching but was currently shaking like a cowering, abused puppy. He took her hand, wrapped her fingers around the tests, swallowed, and announced the results.

"They're positive. All of 'em."

She opened her eyes, looked at the seemingly innocuous but severely alarming sticks, and began to choke on her own breath. When her legs simultaneously gave out, the tests clattering to the floor, he caught her by the arms, easing her down to sit on the toilet, and put her head between her knees.

"Breathe, Merri," he said gently. "Just breathe."

He rubbed her back in small circles as she gradually calmed, not even mentioning the distressing news that sent his previously unflappable fellow agent into hysterics. He had to tell her. He had to. But she needed to calm down first, so that she could actually hear what he had to say, what she seemed not to know herself.

"I can't do this," she said softly after she's begun to breathe normally once more. "The thought that there's part of one of _them _inside of me. That I'll never be rid of them..."

"What if it's not one of theirs?"

She gave him a 'what the fuck?' expression, as if he'd accused her of being a, well, something unpleasant.

"Ya really don't remember that night?" he asked. The 'what the fuck?' expression persisted, this time with a trace of 'are you insane?'. But at least his seeming idiocy had distracted her from her panic attack.

"What are you on about, LaSalle?"

Time to bite the bullet.

"I sorta dismissed it as a really intense dream," he said. Until she'd said those words 'I think I'm pregnant' not an hour ago. Her look was simultaneously incredulous and exasperated. "Remember the Chapin case?"

She nodded. It'd been, what, only six or seven weeks ago? And it had been a doozey. Well, in the broad spectrum of crime, it wasn't all that shocking or horrifying, any more than the other terrible crimes people perpetrated against one another. Its specific nature had been devastating for two agents suffering what was basically post traumatic stress due to being kidnapped and tortured. While on leave, an ensign had stumbled across a young woman, dirty, beaten. She'd escaped her captors, who'd been keeping her locked up in a shed to use for their own twisted amusement. He'd tried to help her, but they'd been close on her trail. The ensign had been shot and killed. They'd found his body, and the girl's, who'd been promptly executed as well. Eventually, they had tracked down the killers. Brody had lost her cool in the interrogation room and broken one of the raping, murdering bastard's hands in three places. Besides that, she was as distant as she'd ever managed to be, refusing to talk to Chris about her state of mind. So he'd went and gotten good and trashed, returning to her home (where he'd been staying for the past month and a half) and passing out on the couch.

"It made me downright mad that ya could just bottle it all up, refused to talk to me," he said. "That's why I got blind drunk. And then ya needed me, after all."

"I'm sorry," she said softly. "I didn't think that you might have needed me. I was lost and hurting. I should've talked to you earlier in the day instead of alienating you, using you because I needed you to hold me, to make the nightmares go away."

She blushed, looked away. In their sane moments they never talked about how she so often had slept in his arms, how they could sometimes only find solace when they were tangled up in one another. It wasn't sexual. At least, it never had been until that night...

"I shoulda known better than to crawl into bed with ya when I was drunk, Merri," he said. "I shoulda stopped ya..."

But he had been too incoherent to have realized she was having the strangest of psychological breaks. He apologized for it now, earning him a look of incredulous bewilderment, forcing him to tell her how he'd woken in the middle of the night to find himself not only fully aroused, but with good reason. She was on top of him, straddling his hips with the entire, painfully hard length of him buried inside of her. The world was a little hazy, because he was quite obviously still very intoxicated, but he could see that her eyes were closed and her lips parted as she moaned softly, her nipples visibly hard points through his worn cotton t-shirt that she sometimes wore to bed. He'd clumsily reached for, and eventually found her hips as they rocked slowly atop him. He should've told her to stop. It hadn't been right. But god, she'd felt so _damned_ good. So _good_. Riding him with increasing intensity, the friction a consuming sensation. Not once did she look at him, so he should've known, but all he did in his drunken bliss was close his own eyes, try to hang on to her hips and let his body reach its natural climax, enjoying the extra buzz in his head that accompanied his release. Being drunker than a skunk, he'd passed out almost immediately afterward.

"When ya never gave any indication that somethin' had happened, I assumed I'd simply had a perverted wet dream in my drunken stupor," he concluded. Brody's mouth was hanging open, her eyes wide. But there was significant color rising in her pale cheeks.

"Oh my god," she said, recovering her senses, but still appearing as shocked as ever. "I remember that morning. There was... I just thought my body was still messed up from... I took advantage of you?"

Now it was his turn to be shocked. How in the hell did she come to that conclusion?

"You were drunk and I... God, I'm sorry, Chris."

His first name? She must be really concerned. When she was lucid, she called him LaSalle, an attempt to distance herself from him, for the sake of propriety and professionalism, which he could give a shit about. Not when she was hurting. Not when she might be pregnant by him, and all because he'd been stupid and selfish one night.

"I may have been drunk, but you were havin' a psychotic break or somethin'," he said, placing a hesitant hand on her knee in an attempt to comfort her, assuage his own guilt. "It shouldn'ta happened, but it did. And it might mean that it's not a piece of one of those worm-eaten bastards inside of ya, if that helps ease your mind at all."

"You're not just making up stories to make me feel better, are you?" she asked, giving him a stern look she used in interrogations. But he could see the hopeful pleading beneath it.

"I would never lie to ya, Merri." And it was the god's honest truth. She nodded, silently. And when she spoke, her voice was as quiet and breathy as a timid young child's.

"What do we do now?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Not much to say about this fic, besides that it's probably super angst-ridden to counter the fluffiness of the other fic I'm currently writing… at least that's my excuse. Not that I ever need one to abuse the hell out of characters.**

* * *

The doctor, naturally was miffed to be lectured before seeing a patient by that patient's... well, Chris LaSalle had used the term 'partner', but he was pretty sure the doctor had assumed that meant 'boyfriend' or 'baby-daddy' (which actually might just be the case, but the insufferable ass didn't need to know that).

The dark haired, slightly salt and pepper, middle-aged man was giving the federal agent an outright impatient look, like he did not care to hear about his patients' lives or situations in the least. The somewhat aloof, nearly callous reception was almost enough to make Chris collect Brody from the waiting room and remove her from the OBGYN office. Except, it was the only place he'd been able to get her in first thing in the morning. He'd find her someplace better later, if he had to, just so she would never have to deal with this jerk again. But right now, she needed answers. They both did.

Yet, the situation was delicate.

"Don't worry about your girlfriend," Dr. LaCombe said placatingly, obviously having not listened to a word Chris had said. It had already taken him ten minutes of persuading to get the nurse to even go ask the doctor to see him before Brody's exam. "Everything will be fine."

"As I've been tellin' ya," Chris said through gritted teeth. "She ain't my girlfriend. She's my _partner_. We're federal agents."

"Well, we're always happy to serve law enforce-"

"She requires special care." Chris opted not to let the doctor get in a word edgewise, since the taller man had finally condescended to actually make eye contact with him, and Chris held his gaze with one he reserved for suspects. "Three months ago, while workin' a case, she was taken and assaulted. She only trusts me. An' I need to be with her throughout the entire exam, to keep her calm."

The doctor's brow furrowed into a look of either actual concern or intent scrutiny. Chris could give a shit which, as long as he was listening.

"Alright, Mister...?"

"Agent LaSalle." He pressed on, wanting to get the other vital point across before he was dismissed with what he guessed would be some hostility. "An' before we leave here today, she needs ta know how far along she is, if she's pregnant."

Now, it was definitely confusion on the taller, older man's face, and so the now slightly-pissed-off-himself agent was obligated to explain.

"There's a chance the pregnancy is the result of different sexual encounter, and not the... _rape_."

Chris never used the word, not around Brody. He wasn't sure why. Maybe because he felt sullied by it. Maybe because he was afraid it would be a trigger for his partner. Maybe because he felt like it gave a despicable act too much power, to have a specific word to describe it, a word that made it sound somehow different and less than what it was, less than the act of _pure evil _it was. But this dense moron obviously needed to know the specific nature of the situation, the delicacy that with which this exam needed to be handled. And so he'd used the word that caught in the back of his throat and filled his chest with a blind sort of rage.

"Do ya understand me, doc?"

Chris' anger apparently was visible in his eyes, for the doctor swallowed hard and nodded his head.

"Yes, I understand the situation."

"Good. I'll be in the waitin' room," Chris said, turning and making his way back to the side of his partner, who appeared to be reading a magazine... upside down. Yes, Meredith Brody was still a mess, on the edge of falling to pieces. And if that doctor did or said anything to upset her...

He marshaled his rage. Some days, he wished Pride hadn't put those two bastards down so efficiently, depriving Chris of the opportunity to beat them until there was nothing left but a couple piles of meat pulp and chips of bone.

Suddenly, there was a hand on his knee, a touch so gentle and comforting, and _unexpected_ that it pulled him from his vengeful reverie.

"It'll be okay," Brody said. God love that woman. She was a nervous wreck, and yet she tried to comfort him. Suddenly, he wanted more than anything to make her smile.

"That would be more reassurin' comin' from someone _not _readin that magazine like ya are," he said, making her frown in puzzlement.

"You got a problem with _Vogue_?" she asked.

"I do when you're readin' it upside down."

Brody looked down at the glossy pages of the fashion periodical, blinking before laughing lightly. It was a pathetic sort of chuckle, but a genuine one, and he'd take it as a win. She tossed the magazine aside.

"Guess I'm a little nervous," she said, her hand trembled as it still rested on his knee. He took it in his.

"We'll figure this out."

She nodded, but didn't look all that reassured.

…

The doctor had drawn blood, which didn't seem to faze the unflappable Agent Meredith Brody much. But Chris could tell, despite her impressive maintenance of her stoic facade, that the pelvic exam had her in complete freak-out mode inside her head. He knew that nobody had touched her except himself since she'd been assaulted, that all of the invasive medical treatment had been done while she was unconscious, that it was likely only the one or two nurses had even touched her in a passing and absent sort of way. Pride, Loretta and their other friends knew better than to give her a friendly pat on the shoulder, or god forbid, try to hug her.

The doc, to his credit, was incredibly professional as he examined her, but the damaged agent's instinctive response was to recoil, to identify it as more violation of her person. And by extension, by purposefully making himself so in tune with her moods and thoughts over the past few months, Chris instinctively felt protective violence flare up in him, which he fought down as best he could while holding Brody's hand and her gaze, witnessing the panic there that she could not prevent from rising but only attempt to control.

He definitely wasn't paying attention to the specifics of the exam, but knew it was probably uncomfortable for a woman who hadn't been horribly abused just a few months ago, who hadn't been bruised and battered and torn up so badly that she'd been a trembling mess in his arms, soaking his clothing with her blood, needing a transfusion and stitches and spending several days in the hospital. So yeah, he wasn't all that surprised at one point when her breathing turned to sharp gasps, the precursor to her hyperventilating and a full-blown panic attack, and he'd had to coax her down.

"Look at me, Merri. I've got ya. I'm not gonna let anythin' bad happen to ya. No one is gonna hurt ya."

And then the invasive part seemed to be over, and she no longer had to lie there on her back with her legs spread, remembering being maliciously violated. The nurse had tried to boot him out before while the patient undressed, which had forced Chris to quietly explain the situation once more, and so the cheerful, chubby and cute blonde woman simply left them alone when it came time for Brody to change once more. They said it would be fine, that she'd be more comfortable in her own clothes for the ultrasound to be performed.

Apparently, the doctor seemed to agree with the home tests they'd used, so far every indication was that she was pregnant. But that wasn't good enough for Chris, and he didn't think it was good enough for Brody, either. He knew it shouldn't matter. A child was a child. The sins of the father shouldn't matter, didn't affect who the unique individual would be... except, if the pregnancy was the result of rape, how could Merri Brody not see her rapist, relive the assault every time she looked at the child? She shouldn't have to endure that, shouldn't suffer the irreparable changes and damage to her body to produce a child she did not choose to have, could not raise or love like it deserved.

And what difference would it make if it _was_ his, and not some murdering psychopath's? It's not like the partners had consciously chosen to participate in the sex act, let alone considered its consequences.

Chris tried to push the thoughts, the worries about the future out of his mind. One step at a time. All they could do was take this situation little by little.

The nurse and doctor had hauled in the equipment and set it up with practiced efficiency, politely asking the patient to raise her shirt, applying the conductive gel to Brody's naked skin and warning her of its likely chilliness, before applying the probe to her belly. The image on the computer screen was black and white and rather grainy, but Chris had to admit he found the few higher tech, three-dimensional sonograms he'd seen some women show off a little disturbing.

"There it is," the doctor said. _It_ didn't look like much, just a dark blob with some lighter weird shapes fluttering inside of it. But it definitely wasn't _nothing_. It definitely was there. Chris tore his eyes away from the screen for a moment to study the woman lying on her back, gripping his hand rather tight. He briefly wondered if he'd be in the same position six or nine months from now, being her support as she birthed the baby that currently was just a little flutter in her womb. The focused, hard expression on her face gave him no insight to her thoughts. Would she keep it? If it was his, _theirs_, would she keep it?

"That fluttering is the heartbeat," Dr. LaCombe continued to explain the grainy image on the screen, as he slowly passed the probe over Brody's still flat stomach, evaluating the state of her womb. "Looks right on track for seven weeks."

"Seven weeks?" Chris asked, feeling a fluttering deep in his own stomach. "No way she's three months along?"

"Definitely not. Around 12 weeks, the fetus would be something you'd recognize as a baby. At this size and state of development, conception was seven weeks ago, give or take a couple days."

The mother-to-be laid her head back, closing her eyes as she sighed in relief, a relief Chris himself shared. Her pregnancy was still problematic, yes, but maybe she wouldn't wake up screaming in the night anymore. Maybe her tormented subconscious would find some measure of peace.

The question now was _would his_?

* * *

**A/N: So, it's definitely LaSalle's… But what does that mean for their partnership? Will Brody even want to have/keep the baby? What will Pride's reaction be?**


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: I'm disturbingly addicted to this story… I know it's totally out of character and is sort of ridiculous in plot, but I love writing it. I just love it (probably just playing with LaSalle is what's doing it for me).**

* * *

Christopher LaSalle was at a loss. He didn't know how to broach the subject with his partner, his _pregnant _partner, his _pregnant by him _partner. It seemed insensitive and controlling to question her about it every day, or even every other day, or once a week, like he were pressuring her to make the life-altering decision laid out before her, as if she might have forgotten about it, that it didn't likely plague her every minute of every day.

Worst of all, he had no idea, not an inkling of how she felt about the pregnancy, of which way she was leaning, whether to carry it to term or... terminate it. Some days, he wanted to grab her by the arms and shake her. Others, he had to bite the inside of his lip so as not to blurt out 'Are you havin' my baby or not?' in the middle of an investigation. It didn't help that she hadn't told Pride yet, didn't want to 'this soon.' King was one of Chris' closest friends. He respected the man and often sought his opinion on personal matters, and the one he currently found himself in was a fricken doozy of a conundrum. Yet, he was on his own. Was he ever on his own! With Brody refusing to discuss the matter with him. Well, not outright, but when a woman changed the subject often enough, Chris wasn't so dense as to not take the hint.

If she didn't want it, she surely would've made the decision already, gotten it over with when it would be an easier, safer procedure? But conversely, she was not _nestin' _as his mama called it, preparing anything for the baby that was coming. That could just mean that she planned on having it but not keeping it. In that case... he'd take the baby. The thought always made him a bit nervous, but also there was a stubborn sort of certainty in his gut. Chris LaSalle would not abandon his kid. He could understand Brody's reluctance. Raising a child was a daunting task, especially one that wasn't at all expected. But he'd do it. He wouldn't even hold it against her if Merri handed the infant off to him and then never acknowledged it as hers. It was an option he believed she had every right to, given the circumstances of the pregnancy, the lack of any real consent on either of their parts, the mental instability and trauma that had led to it.

He watched his partner where she stood giving her report to Agent Pride, discussing her opinions on the witnesses she'd interviewed. Her blouses had always been on the loose side, but had she sized up to hide that belly that was no longer flat? Would anyone else but him notice the slight swell of her abdomen? At, what, thirteen weeks, it was practically nothing... yet. But give it a few more, and her womb would be swollen and ripe like a giant peach. Would she get little stripes across her smooth, pale skin as her flesh stretched beyond its elasticity? When would her belly button pop out? Would she carry it high and tight, like a beach ball smashed up against her ribs, just beneath her large, heavy breasts? Or would she carry it low, the curve of it swelling just above her pubic bone, an invitingly supple mound that just begged to be stroked... And god help him, the thought of her body grown large and round with his child was extremely arousing.

All these months of bizarre intimacy, he'd managed to combat any instinctual reaction his body had to hers (well, except most apparently that one time when he'd been drunk), and now when things were even more complicated and uncertain between them, he wanted nothing more than to rip her clothes off and explore every inch of her impregnated body. It was disturbing, to say the least.

Having finished her brief with Pride, Agent Brody returned to her work station, and LaSalle tried to ignore the sway of her hips as she walked around her desk to sit. Had they grown wider and rounder already? Was her backside a little fuller? And why did he want to _touch _her so _badly_?

He shook it off. It was just instinct reacting to the knowledge that she was carrying his child, making him even more attached and protective of the woman through physical attraction. Not that he hadn't already become extremely concerned with her welfare over the past several months, since he'd all but witnessed her tortured, and held her broken and bleeding in his arms, unsure whether either of them would survive. And then after that, for months, he was her only comfort, and to be honest, she his.

"Hey, Brody," he said, standing up and stretching. She glanced over at him with her big, dark eyes. God, they were beautiful, expressive eyes... well, if she wanted you to see what she was feeling. She showed him interest and curiosity. "Wanna grab a bite ta eat?"

She looked as if she were about to refuse, but given her condition and how far along she was, and the fact that he hadn't seen her eat a single thing in the past six hours, assuming she had even eaten breakfast before coming in, Chris knew she had to be hungry. Also, his underlying intent in making the invitation might be showing in his eyes as she stared at him for a few seconds.

"Uh... Sure," she said, all business-like. "I'm finished up here, for now, anyway."

He reined in the urge to help her out of her chair, as she rose with a sigh and then began to collect her things. He also resisted the instinct to place his hand on the small of her back, to guide her protectively, possessively, as they left the building and walked the few blocks to a little cafe they frequented for lunch.

"That all ya eatin'?" he asked when she ordered a salad. Damn, woman. It wouldn't be so difficult to keep his mouth shut about the babe growing in her belly if she made some show of _caring_ about it herself. He himself had gone for the café's always superb gumbo. "I thought ya liked Cajun food."

"I do," she replied, settling the napkin in her lap. "It just doesn't like me much anymore."

He gave her a skeptical look. She sighed, a genuinely wistful look on her face.

"It's too spicy," she said. "Gives me heartburn."

She'd just barely begun to show, but apparently the unborn infant was already causing mischief in her body.

"You aren't gettin' sick anymore?" Chris asked, letting the concern show on his face. They were in public yes, but there was no one they knew around, so he didn't have to hide his likely annoying and unwanted protectiveness.

"No," she said. "My stomach just doesn't like adventurous food."

He talked her into ordering the least 'adventurous' actual meal on the menu to accompany her salad, easily convincing her that she was more hungry than rabbit food would satisfy.

"So, what is it?" she asked, sounding slightly irritated bust mostly resigned to hear whatever was obviously weighing on his mind. Chris hoped that it was simply because they'd spent so much time together, so many emotionally raw, unguarded moments, that made her capable of reading him so well. Otherwise, their little secret wasn't likely much a of a secret. But neither was it 'little'.

"When are we gonna tell Pride?" He said 'we' but in reality he knew it was entirely her decision. It was _all_ entirely her decision, which honestly was starting to irritate him a little. He knew it was the right and proper thing to respect her and her choices, because when it came down to it, it was _her_ body. Not his. Yes, he was involved. But he wasn't the primary player here.

"When I'm sure..."

The waiter came back with their drinks, milk for her, lemonade for Chris. When he left, she gave no indication of completing her thought. And Chris didn't especially want the answer. One of the many reasons he never pressed her. He was afraid of what the answer might be. Even worse, he wasn't sure which answer he feared more; that she was going to keep it or get rid of it.

Every signal she gave seemed contradictory. She seemed to be physically taking care of herself. Ordering 'milk' for example. Yet, she refused to give him an outright answer. Perhaps, it scared her to speak it aloud, that she would be a mother in six months' time.

He studied her. He did that a lot. And admittedly, not just for any indication of her thoughts on the subject of their impending child. She was currently staring down the street, at nothing in particular, he guessed, just watching life happen around them. His eyes followed the slender curve of her exquisitely beautiful neck, her smooth, creamy skin lightly dusted with freckles. He'd cradled her face in his hands, hugged her tight to his body, stroked her back and caressed her head, but he'd never touched her there, that sensitive patch of skin reserved for the most intimate of embraces. The incredible desire to kiss her neck flooded him, a hot, overwhelming need blossoming from the core of him, heating his face and groin alike, causing him to grip his thighs to anchor his hands against doing something he'd regret.

As if his tension were a palpable thing to her, her gaze slid back to him, her dark eyes catching him in the act of coveting her, a hint of amusement glimmering in their depths before he looked away, entirely uncomfortable and a bit ashamed for his unwarranted ogling. He took a drink of the cold lemonade, hoping the chill of it would calm his ridiculous libido. Perhaps, he could get away with blaming her hormone levels. He worked in such close proximity to her that her pregnant woman hormones -maybe even there were pheromones involved- were doing their thing, brainwashing his primal male self into wanting to claim her, protect her.

As if consciously already wanting to take care of her wasn't enough...

As their meals arrived, he felt a light tap on his leg, which he ignored, thinking she'd been shifting in her chair and accidentally touched him with the toe of her boot, one of her insanely heeled boots that made her stand taller than him. And then he couldn't ignore it as she ran her foot up and down the outside of his calf. He tried to catch her eye, but she was studiously loading her fork with lettuce and a tomato. He decided to just play along and pretend nothing strange was going on, tearing into his own meal. But then he felt her toes, definitely sans boot stroke his shin. Was she really playing footsie with him? He glanced up at her, to find her staring at him with those goddamn gorgeous dark eyes as she sucked milk through the straw held in her prettily puckered lips.

What the hell was she playing at?

He supposed he had started it, by staring at her with less-than-platonic thoughts in his head... but still, was she really flirting with him?

He hastily squeezed his legs together, catching her foot between his knees as her toes attempted to wander up the inside of his thigh. She returned his accusatory glare with a raised eyebrow and a smug smile twitching her lips. The twinkle in her eye called to his baser instincts, invited them to come out to play.

"Mere," he drawled in warning the nickname he only used in the most intimate and emotionally trying situations.

"What?" Her grin was outright mischievous.

What went on inside the woman's head was a complete fucking mystery to him. He thought he knew her, could read her moods, but sometimes they came straight out of left field and took him entirely by surprise.

"Are you feelin' okay?"

He tried to read her, but could find no sign of duplicitousness, that she might be trying to shock him, to distract him from the conversation he had wanted to have, but no longer seemed as important to his admittedly aroused self. She seemed generally in an amorous and affectionate mood. something that they'd never actually experienced with one another, despite his spending countless hours tenderly holding her, despite his knocking her up. Nothing lustful, besides his inappropriate thoughts that he rapidly squashed whenever they arose, had ever blossomed between them… before now.

"Pretty good, actually," she said, finally breaking the intense eyes contact to take another bite of her simply garnished, broiled fish, before adding, "Just a little lonely at night."

His balls tightened. God help them, they did, as he couldn't help but ponder what exactly it would take to make her feel less lonely at night.

"Want some comp'ny?" he asked, trying to seem nonchalant. "We could make some popcorn 'n' watch a movie..."

Her grin informed him of precisely what else they could do.

"Sounds good," she said.

Little did she know, that they'd be having the conversation she just successfully avoided, whether or not it was a complete mood killer.

* * *

**A/N: Poor LaSalle, all confused about his conflicting feelings for Brody… And still in the dark about how she feels about the baby…**


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: Not sure if this is pushing the 'T-Rating'…? Please let me know.  
**

**Warning: Borderline Smut... Not too graphic?**

* * *

She'd shut him down again. How did she do that?

Well, it was most apparent how she'd done that. And it was his own damn fault for being so _easy_ to manage, wasn't it?

Chris sighed heavily. And, as if to prove his point to himself, it was more in contentment than frustration. He was feeling fine. _Real fine_.

He pulled the naked woman curled against his side tighter to him, her own breathy sigh dewing against his chest hair, her large, firm breasts pressing against his ribs, the nipples noticeably hard points, her stomach molded to his side, one leg thrown over his, the dampness between her thighs glazing his hip.

"Mmm..." She moaned softly, her body was still twitching slightly with the aftershocks of climax. "That was... _nice_."

He chuckled. He couldn't help it. 'Nice' did not remotely cover what _that _had been. Her tone and the way she snuggled into his side seemed to indicate that she agreed, that 'nice' was the best she could come up with because she was at a loss, a wonderful, blissful loss of words.

Chris had imagined Merri Brody would be excellent in bed. Hell, even drunk and in the midst of the strangest of sexual encounters, which she didn't even remember, he'd been amazed by how damn good she'd felt. But this time, with both of them in possession of their faculties, hyper-aware and sensitive to every inch of the other's body, every minute response, it'd been far beyond any other sexual experience he'd ever had.

The woman had been so closed off these past couple of months that it'd taken him entirely by surprise how she'd opened herself to him. She'd stripped off her clothes and her emotional barriers alike, making love to him with unreserved passion, taking him into her arms and into her body. And into her soul with her captivating dark eyes.

As soon as they'd kissed, the first time they'd ever engaged in such an embrace, he should've known it would be unlike anything he'd experienced before. Her taste was a rich, earthy sweetness. Her lips soft. Her mouth hot. Her body that perfect combination of supple and firm that made women just so damn appealing. The almost imperceptible slight swell of her belly begged for his attention, but he gave it no more preference than the rest of her deliciously responsive body. She'd been warm and snug, almost uncomfortably tight, but it was the way she responded to him, to the touch of his hands and mouth, the press of his body, the thrust of his hips... that made the encounter undeniably the most erotic of his life. Her sighs and moans and whimpers. Her unabashed, whispered pleas for him, to touch her, to take her, to surrender to her. The way her muscles tensed and relaxed, her lips parted as she gasped for air, her eyelids fluttering and her thighs squeezing his hips tight. How she touched him with her beautiful, skilled hands that seemed to have uncanny knowledge of his body... She was the most breathtaking experience of his life.

He could live forever in her arms, in the eternal bliss of her. But sadly, Chris LaSalle was too much of an idiot to even wholly savor the night he had with his perfect sexual match.

He was stroking the bare arm draped across his stomach, listening to her breathe, feeling his heart beat gradually slowing, wondering if he could find hers somewhere beneath those incredibly large breasts. Before, she'd been a rather busty woman for someone so slender, but now with the pregnancy hormones flooding her body, changing her, the size of her chest seemed almost absurd. Chris could certainly see where the slang term 'melons' came from. He pressed a hand to her back instead, trying to detect the beating of her heart from a more accessible point, moving it around like a doctor applying a stethoscope.

"What are you doing?" Amusement tinged her quiet voice.

"Tryin' ta find your heartbeat," he said, thinking he could almost feel a faint thumping.

"Why?" She laughed lightly. "You think you might have killed me?"

Merri pushed herself up, folding her arms upon his chest, to look down at him, smile twitching her dark pink, kiss-swollen lips.

"It was good, I'll give you that." She was apparently in a teasing mood. "But you didn't stop my heart."

He teased back.

"Good. I'd like ta keep ya around for awhile." He grabbed her waist in a not entirely mockingly possessive manner. "At least 'til ya pop out my baby."

The flirtatiousness immediately fled her face, replaced by that shielded expression of hers he knew so well. And he immediately regretted trying to tease her about being knocked up. But in his defense, he hadn't been able to get at her any other way, either, and he naturally fell into teasing as means of social interaction.

She pushed herself up off from him, and despite how much he wanted to fight her, grip her waist even tighter and prevent her running away, he knew it would only make things worse, so he let go as she rolled away from him, got out of bed and went to pick clothes off from the pile in the corner. She seemed to realize as she was pulling the garment over her head that the t-shirt was one of his, changed her mind and tossed it aside, and went hunting for something else. Did she realize that when she bent over to seize the articles of clothing she now seemed fixated on using to cover her nakedness from his eyes that he could see _everything_ down to the evidence of their recent unguarded and unrestrained coupling glistening on her still pink and swollen flesh?

He didn't say anything, didn't move. With Meredith Brody, when she lost control, it was better just to wait it out until she mastered her emotions enough to face the outside world once more. Used to be that he was the one that helped her recapture that stability. Now he appeared to be the one she used her control to keep out.

Finally dressed in a pair of yoga pants and a fitted t-shirt that only emphasized the insanely sexy curves of her body, which was likely not her intention at all, she turned to face him.

"I think you should leave," she said, as calm and cool as ever.

"I'm not goin' anywhere, Mere." He moved to a sitting position, but did not leave her bed, staring her down, letting the determination show on his face, hoping it wouldn't be a challenge she would try to win with her own epic stubbornness.

"This is my home," she said. "And I'm asking you to leave."

She was refusing to look at him. He got to his feet, moved to stand before her, slowly reached out and placed his hands on her arms, not pulling at her or coaxing her, just touching her.

"Why won't ya talk to me?" he asked.

"I'm hardly ignoring you, am I?" Her tone was defensively snippy, but it was true. He couldn't accuse her of neglect, not after what they'd just done. But how could she be so close to him, so unreserved and open with him while they were making love and then shut down entirely when he mentioned the child they'd put in her belly?

"No. You've taken good care of me, Merri," he said, referring to the intimacy of their cuddling up in the evening, then making out and then moving to the bedroom for those ecstasies. "But you're still keepin' me out an' I wanna know why?"

Her mask cracked a little as she chewed her lip, closed her eyes and sighed forlornly.

"I'm not trying to be cruel," she said when she opened her eyes again, pinning him with one of her piercing stares. "I just can't make you promises I don't intend to keep."

He felt a knot form in his stomach.

"Ya mean the baby?"

She didn't want it. She didn't want to have his child. How could he have been so _stupid_ as to think that she would?

"No," she said, sighed again. "Yes. I don't know."

The pain of confusion was obvious in her face.

"Ya can't just ignore it forever." He tried to filter the frustration out of his voice, to only give her the sympathy and concern he felt for her, but he couldn't say how successful he was. "That baby's gonna keep growin' while ya debate its future."

"I know!" Now her mask had shattered. Guilt stabbed him and twisted in his gut as tears streaked down her cheeks. He wondered how much she cried because of him... how the strong woman had probably rarely done so before meeting the likes of him, before he'd failed to protect her from those psychopaths' brutal hands, before he'd complicated her life by unintentionally impregnating her, before he caused her so much more stress forcing her to respond to him, to consider his wishes, his thoughts and feelings, in addition to her own turmoil.

Now, he pulled her into his arms, and she buried her face against his shoulder. This, this he knew how to do, how to comfort her, calm her. He stroked her head and back.

"I... I just need a little more time to figure this out," she said. "Just give me a little more time, _please_?"

"It's okay, Mere," he said. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean ta pressure ya. I just don't wanna see ya shut down, suffer later because ya can't face things now. I wanna be here for ya."

She kissed his shoulder, followed it with more light touches of her lips, traveling up his neck until she whispered in his ear.

"Thank you, Chris."

* * *

**A/N: Um… they're sort of figuring things out? Or are they just making the situation more complicated?**

**A/N2: I apologize, it does feel like I'm stringing you guys along worse than Brody is with LaSalle (although she doesn't mean to be), but I promise the 'plot' will progress with the next update. **


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note: I actually don't have much to say about this chapter… Until after you read it...  
**

**Warning: Sensitive Subject Matter and Minor Coarse Language.**

* * *

"Pride."

Chris studied the houses as they passed by, patiently waiting to continue their discussion as his boss answered his ringing cell phone with one hand and continued to steer the old caddy with the other.

"Incident? What sort of incident?"

The younger agent's attention was drawn immediately to the audible end of the phone conversation.

"Was anyone hurt?"

The senior agent pulled the Cadillac over to the curb, and Chris thought that maybe that was a good thing, because his stomach had suddenly twisted up into knots, and if what his guts seemed to instinctively fear was true, he might just throw up.

"No. You go on to the hospital and get fixed up. We're on our way over there. The uniforms can keep an eye on the prisoner until we arrive."

Pride ended the called and turned to Chris.

"Looks like our Agent Brody nabbed the bad guy."

Chris tried to appear like he wasn't about to vomit from outright anxious terror for the woman's state of health.

"What happened?" He surprised himself by being able to make the inquiry with only the 'appropriate' level of concern for his partner. Why it was at all important to maintain the facade of there only being a professional, working relationship between Merri and him at this moment of pure panic, Chris had no idea. But he did it for her. At least, he tried.

"Believe it or not, Leonard Maddox returned to the scene of the crime."

Merri still hadn't told Pride about her being in a delicate condition, but she'd been -thankfully- avoiding the potentially dangerous situations they encountered in their line of work. While the two male agents went to track down leads, she had taken the follow-up interview with the wife of the victim that morning, which should've been safe enough, because who was stupid enough to ever return to the scene of the crime?

"An'..." Chris prompted, desperate to hear that Merri was safe and sound.

"Brody heard a ruckus in the basement, went to investigate, there was a bit of a scuffle, apparently, she chased him back up through the house, they struggled... and went through the first floor bay window."

"What?!" There was no filtering his reaction now. The panic was a physical pain in his stomach. "Is she okay?"

"Just a nasty gash on her arm. The paramedics are takin' good care of her, Christopher. But they say it'll need stitches, so she's headed over to the hospital. We have to get over to the Carpenter's place to care of the scene."

He should've just bit his tongue and done as he was told. That's what Merri would've wanted him to do, but he wouldn't have been able to focus, anyway.

"I wanna go ta the hospital, make sure Brody's okay," Chris said, locking eyes with his mentor. He was showing everything, and he didn't care, because Pride needed to realize that Chris was going straight to Meredith Brody to make sure with his own two eyes that his... lover (that was probably the best term for what she'd become to him) was safe and sound.

Pride sighed, then seeming resigned, nodded. But apparently, the younger man wasn't going to avoid the lecture.

"You made me a promise, Christopher," he said. "When I agreed not to force Brody to seek more intensive psychiatric treatment for her trauma. You said you would help her, that you would have her back, that you would tell me if she _did_ need therapy."

They both knew Merri Brody was too wily for psychoanalysis, and would've had to have been willing to submit to it for therapy to work, which she hadn't been. She'd seemed okay with the comfort Chris had been able to offer her, only they'd gotten too close...

"An' I've done that, King. We just-"

The older man was having none of Chris' excuses or rationalizations. And to be honest, Chris _did_ feel like he'd failed his female partner, in so many ways.

"And you _promised_ me, that you wouldn't cross any lines, not with her in such a vulnerable place."

Oh, he'd definitely broken that promise. Chris pursed his lips, clenched his jaw. It hadn't been like _that_. Only, it sort of had. Because...

"We were both messed up worse than I thought," he said quietly. "I shoulda never made that promise."

Dwayne Pride sighed again.

"And I shouldn't've asked you to make it."

Chris, who'd been avoiding his boss-friend-mentor's gaze looked at the older man in shock. Was he really being forgiven for behaving inappropriately with a fellow agent?

"A man can't promise not to have feelings," Pride said with a sympathetic look that then turned hard, along with his voice. "But I expected you to show some sort of control over them."

He shook his head. "This isn't like you, Christopher. I guess I should've been paying more attention to your mental state, as well as hers."

Chris didn't say anything, just chewed the inside of his cheek, debating how much more disappointed his old friend would be if he revealed the other little secret at play in the whole awkward affair... the baby.

"You can get a ride to the hospital after we at least secure the scene, alright?"

It was the best offer he was going to get -well, the only one that wouldn't set him against the man whose opinion mattered most to him. Chris LaSalle had many acquaintances, but few close friends. He could talk to Pride about everything…everything but Merri Brody and the baby, which frustratingly he could not talk to her about either.

But god, he hoped she -_they_\- were unharmed. Maybe this half-possession he had of the woman, when she was open and affectionate wasn't anything remotely like a real relationship, but he didn't want to lose it, didn't want her to withdraw from him because she thought he'd compromised her. Because over the past few months, Meredith Brody had become the center of his world.

…

When Chris had finally managed to escape his crime scene duties and booked it over to the hospital where a brief text exchange had informed him Brody still resided, the receptionist and then a nurse directed him to the room where he could find the injured agent. He willed all of the anxieties out of his head with a deep breath before he knocked on the door and entered when a feminine voice bid him do so.

She was tucked up in a hospital bed, wearing one of those nasty gowns that tied up the back, an IV line in the arm that wasn't wrapped in white gauze. Upon his arrival, she'd sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. Even when she'd been battered and bruised, naked and trembling in is arms, nearly suffocated, she hadn't looked so... _frail_.

His stomach hurt. Because she looked utterly drained. And they'd obviously admitted her, not just stitched her up and let her go.

"I miscarried," Meredith Brody announced in a flat, hollow voice. He clenched his jaw against the profound wave of loss, pursing his lips to fight the sob of emotion. He nodded his head.

"I figured they wouldn't be keepin' ya for a relatively minor laceration," he said, not looking directly at her, unsure whether he should touch her or not. "Are you okay?"

"No." His eyes instantly snapped to her, trying to find some visible evidence of physical injury, but besides her bandaged arm and her pale, almost ashen skin tone, there was only her puffy, red-rimmed eyes. Maybe she'd been crying. But maybe she was just exhausted and weak. "But they say I'll recover."

Chris simply nodded again. He felt empty, had no words, had no clue what to say or do. His own feelings were so distant from him, that he could not even fathom discerning hers. After a moment of painful silence, filled only with the noise of the hospital seeming more remote than it was, his gaunt partner spoke in that same flat tone.

"It was a girl."

A girl. His little girl. His little girl that he'd never held in his arms, _would _never hold in his arms.

For some reason, the pronouncement made the loss all the more real, and rage filled that empty place inside of him. It was a blinding, hot sort of pain, that obliterated the world, made him want to lash out in anger. He looked at the woman sitting in the hospital bed, as stoic as a statue, and just as _fucking unfeeling_. Did she care? Did she care at all? Had she ever? Had she just been playing with him the whole time, to hide the fact that she didn't actually have a feeling heart in her?!

"There was an easier way to end the pregnancy, ya know, if ya didn't want her," he said icily. He watched the remaining color drain from Merri's face.

"What?" she said in the smallest voice he had ever heard her use.

"Ya never wanted this baby an' ya purposefully put yourself at risk so ya wouldn't hafta make the decision to get rid of her."

He regretted the words almost immediately, ones born of devastating loss and anger, ones that could never be unsaid.

"Get out," she said.

"Mere, I-"

"Get out! I don't want to see you!"

There was nothing to do but comply, leaving her loudly sobbing, broken form looking small in the hospital bed.

_What the hell had he done?_

* * *

**A/N: I never said this was a fluffy fic... And yes, this was where it was going from the beginning, and I also know how it's going to end.**

**A/N 2: I know. You're going to yell at me for making LaSalle an insensitive jerk, which he undeniably was, but at the same time, I hope I've been doing his point of view justice, that Brody's given him nothing to make him believe she ever wanted or cared about their baby, and that the frustration finally escaped in the form of blind anger when the agony of the loss broke him, that he couldn't see her pain through his own until it was too late.  
**

**A/N 3: So, the question is, will they be able to resolve their issues? Will they be able to find comfort in one another as they've done before, only maybe with actual communication this time? Or will they just push each other away? **


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note: This little angst-fest should be wrapped up soon…**

* * *

It had been 17 days since Chris LaSalle had been thrown out of that hospital room, since he'd left his former lover, his partner, broken and alone. He'd been such an asshole. But he had no idea how to fix it. And so he'd simply done the craven thing, and given Meredith Brody her 'space.'

He hadn't seen or talked to her in those 17 days. She was on medical leave from work, and Chris worried about her almost every minute of every day. But he knew both Loretta and Pride checked in on their damaged friend. He tried to smile when they informed him that although she didn't seem to be doing all that well, she definitely was no worse.

Helping people through depression was never something Chris was good at, anyway. His brother's issues proved that clear enough. Maybe they were both better off without his interference.

She didn't want to see him.

How could she want to see the man who'd put her through such hell?

Chris tried to focus on the case files laid out before him. Throwing himself into work was almost distraction enough, even though Pride had admonished his junior agent for pulling too many all-nighters at the office. But the alternative was going out and drinking himself into a stupor. And that was a trap best to be avoided.

_Dammit, Merri._

He still dreamed about the intoxicating scent of her, the vaguely coconut smell of her hair, the feel of her smooth warm skin, her firm but also supple body, her smile... her eyes. They were dreams not only restricted to the night.

He missed her. _Badly_. It was a persistent, almost nauseating ache in his stomach. And when he thought about why she was gone, why he could no longer hold her in his arms... He wondered what their little girl would've been like… Slender like her mother, with dark hair and big, round, dark eyes and a smile that lit up the world? Would she have been a firebrand? Smart as a whip? Or just a sweet, average little girl, the center of her father's world?

Contemplations he should _not_ entertain, not if he wanted to move on from the grief of the loss, not if he would ever be able to face Meredith Brody again, and beg her forgiveness.

"Hey, Christopher, did you ever get a match on that ID from the..." Pride trailed off, causing Chris to glance up, becoming himself transfixed by the figure outlined in the door. Pride recovered first. "Hello, Brody. Nice to see you out and about, but you're not due back for another two weeks."

She took a couple steps inside, but said nothing, just gave her fellow agents a forced, sad smile.

"What can we do ya for?" Pride asked, closing the distance between them and rubbing her arm with all of the gentle concern Chris himself had not been able to offer her whilst wallowing in his own grief.

"I..." Her eyes found Chris, who'd finally managed to find his feet and rise out of his chair. "I wanted to talk to LaSalle."

Pride nodded. "I was just headed out to meet Laurel for lunch."

The older, and much wiser man gave Chris a warning look. _Don't mess this up._

_I'll try my best not to, King._

Suddenly, butterflies were fluttering in his stomach, as the only sound in the large room were Agent Dwayne Pride's footsteps as he left his two emotionally battered junior agents to make amends... hopefully.

The two former lovers just stared at one another across the space that had never before felt so very expansive. He wasn't sure how long they stood there, apart yet the only ones in the universe... it might have been a blink of an eye. It might have been an eternity. But finally, he could stand it no longer and slowly approached the woman, as if she were a wild animal prone to bolt at any misstep. Yet when he was at last just an arm's length from her, he had no idea what to do, whether he could touch her, what he could or _should_ say. He just looked at her, the heartbreaking appearance of her, a little too thin, dark circles under her eyes, her lips a hard line, a wrinkle in her brow and at the corner of her mouth, a deep anguish in her dark eyes.

Before he could search for the words, reach out to her, she began to speak with a determined expression on her tired face.

"I wanted her. I-" Her voice broke, but she stood firm, paused to collect herself, and finished saying what she'd come there to stay to him, all the while staring him directly in the eye. The pain emanating from her was palpable. "I wanted her to have your blue eyes."

Chris felt like he'd been gutted all over again, and by his own hand. The loss was the cutting edge, but the guilt over hating Meredith Brody -yes, he'd hated her, god forgive him- was the hand that thrust the blade deep and twisted it about. Coward that he was, he looked away, nodded his head, the emotion so thick it clogged his throat. He swallowed it down convulsively, as hard as he could until he thought he might get the words past the anguish.

He looked at what should have been the mother of his child, his little girl.

"An' I was hopin' she'd have your big, beautiful brown eyes."

She stepped in close, spreading her arms as if to embrace him, and he fell to his knees, wrapping his arms about her waist and burying his face in the sweatshirt covering her belly, her belly that once contained their nascent child. Her hands soothed him, stroking his head and shoulders. She would've been a good mother. How could he have ever hated her for what was just an accident, a cruel twist of fate? How could he have ever accused her of purposefully miscarrying their baby?

And just like that, all of the tension that had coiled so tightly inside of him over the past few weeks snapped, a torrent of emotion flowing from his ruptured heart.

"I'm so sorry, Merri." He rose back to his full height, enough that he had to look down a few inches to study her face, since she was in flats instead of the heels that made her as tall, if not taller, than him. "How are ya doin'? Are ya okay? What can I do?"

He kissed her face, as her hands wrapped around him, and then they were hugging in an embrace so tight he wasn't sure whether she was trying to wrap herself up in him forever.

"I haven't been able to sleep," she said, the insane, desperate anguish of the insomniac a recognizable strain in her voice. "I'm so _tired_."

"Me, too," he said, releasing her from the hug, but slipping an arm around her to keep her close to his side. "Let's get outta here. We can talk..." She sighed, sounding as exhausted as she looked. "Or take a nap."

She smiled wanly. "I'd like that."

They left the building, Chris only remembering to call Pride and informing him he was taking the rest of the day off after he'd helped Merri into his truck. They could pick up her car later... he couldn't believe she'd driven herself to the office in such a state. But, hell, she wasn't the best at realizing when she needed to be taken care of...

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**A/N: Somewhat on the mend….? **


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note: This demanded to be finished before any other fics could be continued ;-) Sort of short for a final chapter, but it's all it wanted to be (needed to be, at least in my mind)...**

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Chris LaSalle awoke, slightly disoriented by the late afternoon sun shining through the window, and then immensely relieved and happy to discover the woman curled up against his side. They'd been too exhausted for words, emotional drain transforming into a significant physical effect, and had merely gone straight to her bedroom to sleep. He hadn't needed to hear her say she forgave him, that she was okay. The way she looked at him had been enough. The unconscientious way in which she undressed in front of him, naked but for a pair of panties, before pulling on one of his t-shirts he'd left behind (or she'd stolen)… The natural ease in which she willingly snuggled into his arms... There was no hate between them. No lasting resentment or malice. The pain and grief was so thick that it seemed like a tangible blanket wrapped about them, but not between them. And together, they'd fallen into a deep, healing sleep.

Except, there was something strange, he realized as he came more fully awake, watched the woman begin to stir against him.

"Uh, Mere, is this normal?"

She blinked sleepily at him, looked at the wet stains he indicated on his shirt, then looked down at her own chest, the substantial damp spots soaking the cotton t-shirt over her breasts, wetting the fabric so that he could see the large, dark nipples beneath. Pain flashed across her face and he immediately regretted saying anything. He'd only been concerned that she wasn't okay, that it was a sign of some lasting damage from the miscarriage.

"My milk must be trying to come in," she said, lightly touching her leaking breasts. "There's no baby inside of me, the drop in hormones made my body think it gave birth."

His hands gravitated to her chest in absent curiosity, but she stopped him before he could cup her, could feel the still heavy weight of her swollen flesh, or run a thumb over the functional nipples in pure fascination.

"Don't touch them," she said. "It will only make it worse. It has to dry up. There's no baby to nourish."

And then she began to cry for the still raw loss. He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her to him once more, this time even more carefully than before, afraid of agitating her large breasts and encouraging the milk to flow. The sooner her body recovered, the sooner her battered heart could begin to heal.

He rocked her gently in his arms, stroking her back and kissing the top of her head, heedless of the ripe smell of colostrum, the unpleasant dampness of her chest pressed to his, the obviously unwashed state of her hair. None of it mattered, none of it could put him off from holding her, from trying to ease her pain as she slowly but surely calmed.

"Chris?" She sounded more steady, sounded like Agent Brody. Not the withdrawn woman, but the confident, self-assured one.

"Yes?"

"I want to have a baby with you," she said, shocking him into immobility. After all the suffering surrounding the one they never meant to have and lost, it surprised him to say the least. "You don't have to decide now. Just promise me you'll think about it.

"And know I wouldn't make the same mis-" she choked on the word, but continued after only a second's hesitation. "Mistakes again. I'd take care of the baby, of myself. I was just so frightened about how my life was unexpectedly changing, I didn't realize how much I really wanted her until she was gone."

"Shh..." He soothed her as best he could, but he couldn't let her think he still blamed her. "Me, too. It hit me hard an' I lashed out at ya. Ya needed me an' I pushed ya away. An' I don't think I'll ever forgive myself."

"If we're going to be friends..." She blushed a little as she played with the neckline of his t-shirt. It was beautiful on her pale skin. "Or more... I think we both need to forgive ourselves, as well as each other."

"You're a smart woman, Meredith Brody." He leaned in to place a chaste peck on her cheek, but she sought his lips with her own, pulling him into a lengthy, expressive kiss that gave him all the answers he ever needed, to questions he would never have thought to ask.

To show respect for her, that he took such a request seriously, he knew he should take several days if not a week or two pondering her proposition, but the honest truth was that he needed to do no such thing.

"I'd make a baby with ya right now, Mere, if we could."

"Physically, I think we can," she said, indicating that she had healed up, even if her body's hormones were still settling down. Her hand moved from the neck of his shirt down his chest, covering his heart with her palm. "But I think we should wait a few months, let ourselves finish grieving."

He wrapped his arms around her, hugged her tight to him, buried his face in her hair, loving even the unwashed scent of her, the warmth and strength of her, and thinking that a battered heart just might not take an eternity to heal, not if it has the company of another.

END

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**A/N: I guess I'm done being mean to them… for now. ;-)**


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